Aircraft used: PMDG 738, IniBuilds 310
Live weather: on
This is actually a package that includes five Greenlandic airports, including the island’s main gateway at Kangerlussuaq (Danish: Sondre Stromfjord, hence the ICAO airport code).
DETAIL
MK’s penultimate project features a detail-rich rendition of Kangerlussuaq’s airport, plus a slightly less-detailed city. Despite being an international airport, the terminal is only small and handles Air Greenland flights almost exclusively (including their new A330-800).
The terminal is highly detailed, both inside and out, and the majority of the texturing is high-res. Inside we get static people. The landside area is pretty average but I imagine that’s due to there not being a great deal there in reality — it must be borne in mind that this place really is close to the edge of the world! There’s a fully modelled kids’ playground which I THINK is landside (but who knows, might be airside?). There’s also a pole in this area, to which are fastened several signs, pointing towards various major world cities and inclusive of their distances. Y’know, the stuff people love to include in their travel selfies…
On the southern side of the field is the USAF airbase, where we find a selection of static fighters and helicopters, plus a handful of military trucks — all nicely modelled with high-res textures. The buildings here, including the tower, are just as well made. We’re also treated to a couple of Air Greenland Dash 8s, parked outside their bright red maintenance hangar (although they’re a bit more basic than the military statics).
The airfield perimeter, as you’d expect, is pretty bleak, even in summer — MK seem to have done a great job in recreating the barren tundra landscape and around the runway 27 end we get a modelled perimeter road, complete with stubby lightpoles (presumably for clearance reasons as the threshold is REALLY close to the road!), full signage, custom vegetation, boulders and wooden benches.
Much of the city (if you can call it that!) is done in lower-res than the terminal but it still looks decent. There’s some sort of mast and a shack on a hill overlooking the airport.
The four other airports included in the package are only tiny but their quality isn’t too far off that of the main Kangerlussuaq gateway. The recent World Update 15 covered Greenland and it’s made the areas around each of these airports pretty unique. When I first started flying around with this product installed, I noticed that each of these four smaller airports features an identical terminal building — a boxy, wooden structure with the tower protruding from the exact centre of the roof. I kinda thought to myself, “what a cop-out by MK, saving on development work by using the same terminal four times!” After consulting numerous real-life images, however, it turns out these four airports DO actually share an identical terminal design! MK, you’re off the hook!
On a final note, the marketing blurb mentions snow effects and floating icebergs, the latter apparently appearing randomly when certain weather criteria are met. On my very first flight around this island dependency, I saw some beautifully modelled icebergs but I’ve since been unable to recreate the conditions in which they can be seen. Wish I’d have taken a photo to illustrate it here!
PERFORMANCE
Fps performance is absolutely fine, unsurprisingly, but stability is average at best, based on the size of the airport. And while the modelled city is very close by, I wouldn’t expect it to have a noticeable, adverse effect on stability. Having said all that, you’re unlikely to run into problems unless you insist on belting around with the drone every few minutes. Stability PER SE is largely fine — I just found it slightly disappointing given the simplicity and remoteness of the real-life airport and city.
I’ve managed to black screen it a couple of times but, conversely, I’ve had a good number of trouble-free flights in and out, mostly using external views.
VERDICT
This package for most people is probably more of a MSFS novelty than anything else and it’s therefore not easy to justify the full price, despite getting quite a lot of scenery for your money. I certainly don’t regret buying it (in a recent sale) but, on the other hand, it’s not somewhere I’m finding myself frequenting. But as I say, for the odd novelty flight, it does exactly what it says on the tin. Stability is perhaps a little worse than I expected but that’s not to say this is a troublesome airport, because it’s really not. Don’t go overboard with the drone and you should be fine.
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